Gilded Age Etiquette: Sensible Humor

“… there is a sensible reason for that rule. You are very liable to cut your mouth with the knife. That is one reason why you should always use your fork in conveying food to your mouth.” Above: Sir Alec Guinness looks on in bemusement as Sir John Mills eats food straight from his knife in 1946’s “Great Expectations.” By the latter half of the 19th century, etiquette books were decrying the practice of eating from one’s knife, though it had earlier been perfectly acceptable behavior in England for hundreds of years.

“Etiquette”

“Pardon me, Cousin Jay, but you should not eat with your knife,” said Mrs. Cittily, addressing her rural relative. “It is not according to the rules of etiquette, you know.”

“Hoh! What's the sense of eterket, anyhow?” airily answered the visitor from the wilds of the Wayback County, passing in the midst of an interesting exhibition of amateur sword-swallowing. “I ain't no dude.”

“I know you are not, Cousin Jay, but there is a sensible reason for that rule. You are very liable to cut your mouth with the knife. That is one reason why you should always use your fork in conveying food to your mouth.”

“Hoh! That ain't no reason at all! A feller that ain’t got sense enough to keep from cuttin’ his mouth with a knife would be just as likely to jab it with a fork.” – In “The World,” 1896

 

🍽️Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor of the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia